Cal Korf

On Friday, November 16, 2007, the Florida State Golf Association inducted Cal Korf into its prestigious Hall of Fame. The ceremony was held at Interlachen Country Club in Winter Park in conjunction with the Annual Dinner.

After running track at Northern Illinois University, serving 25 years in the army, and acting as General Manager for three army golf courses in Hawaii, Cal Korf moved to Sarasota. In 1981, he became involved with the FSGA working the summer events. He was quickly hired as the Executive Director in 1982 and began to work to bring the Association back from only 100 clubs and 400 individual members.

At first, Cal was the only FSGA staff member running events and rating courses. In 1983, Florida was selected as a test state for the GHIN Handicap System which meant Cal also had to promote and service GHIN clubs. Cal was on the road a lot in the early days educating and recruiting new volunteers to help with conducting qualifiers and ratings. It was two years before he could even hire another staff member. Cal was busy working seven days a week conducting USGA and FSGA events, performing course ratings, preparing mailings and paperwork and servicing GHIN clubs. Under Cal’s direction, many new tournaments were brought to the state including the Mid-Senior, Mid-Amateur, and Florida's first-ever US Open Sectional Qualifying at Bay Hill. With all these new events, Cal established relationships with the top clubs in the state. As the FSGA grew, Cal was able to hire a small staff.

In 1984, Florida GolfWeek named Cal the Golf Executive of the Year. In 1996, the University of Florida began the Calvin L. Korf Turfgrass Research Program in cooperation with the United States Golf Association Green Section and the Florida Golf Course Superintendents Association. Together, this endowment helped to improve the turfgrass program and brought light to new forms of grass that are seen today. Cal served the FSGA for 15 years and retired at the age of 65.